Accept

It isn't a big red stamp, but it's very nice to finally have 7 years of work be recognized by the scientific community.

(P.S. It's kind of funny that the button I click to "blog" this item is called "publish")

SLU drama!

Walking to my building from the bus today was an adventure - the entire building is surrounded by gushing water from a broken water main on Dexter. My friend tr already blogged about it here. (Photo from King 5 News, whose studios are located right where the main was breached.)


In other news, I noticed that the new luxury condominium complex on Mercer and 5th Ave N (Lumen condominiums) will have a QFC on the ground floor - very exciting for increasing the lunch options in SLU!

Venting

I really dislike it when a paper has an intriguing title, and then it turns out that either it's a crappy study, or the title was misleading. Every time I look at this paper I get excited and think that it will answer all my questions, and instead, it just disappoints every time. It's really dense, doesn't flow that well, and doesn't really tell me what I think it should. Oh, sure, it talks about VEGF and endothelial cells and vascular development. But it doesn't tell me how they are all interconnected; instead it just recaps the same story that many other review articles cover. Oh well, such is life. And yes, I'm still procrastinating. But I needed to vent. So thanks.

Sunshine and gravel

Lately, I've taken to working rather long hours. I'm not complaining, it comes with the territory of trying to write one's thesis dissertation, but I'm just saying. So today when I headed home early to meet roomie for dinner, it meant that I was actually at the bus stop while the sun was still up. I wouldn't think that this is really that a notable event, except that as I was kicking the gravel rocks back into the strip along the side of the sidewalk like I always do, I thought it was kind of weird to be able to see them clearly. Anyway, thanks for the excuse to get out early, kc!

And yes, I'm procrastinating. :P

New plants

Well, I finally got around to potting up some cuttings I've had sitting in water for WAY too long to admit. The water has been nasty for quite a while. Ick. The new additions are: two pots of Tradescantia zebrina, one pot of Ceropegia woodii (actually not 100% sure that is correct), and one variegated Chlorophytum comosum. I'm not planning to keep any of them except the Ceropegia woodii, if I can manage to find homes for them. I already have too many plants to care for! Also up for adoption are several pots of Ornithogalum caudatum, and several more pots of Chlorophytum comosum.

Florera Greenlake

In other construction news, it appears that the new "Florera Greenlake" condos at Woodlawn and Ravenna have topped out, based on the cupola in this picture:
There's obviously a ton of construction going on all over the city, but I seem to live and work at two relative hot-spots. I used to be intrigued by watching the progress of various building projects, but I have to say that I'm kind of oversaturated and fairly annoyed at the inconvenience they can cause. The future doesn't look too much better, what with the eventual renovation of the old Albertsons lot and even more condos in South Lake Union.

Westlake and Mercer - progress!

Wow, the Streetcar tracks at Westlake and Mercer are really starting to shape up! It looks like they might even be fairly close to re-opening the segment of Westlake between Mercer and Valley that's been closed for nearly a year... (Actually, I can't remember when they started the roadwork there, but it has been many months, if not a year.) But they've repaved the non-tracks segment and even painted lane lines, which I consider to be a strong sign of imminent opening to car traffic. I can only hope that this might help relieve some of the constant congestion this neighborhood has had recently.

Northbound:


Southbound:

Whale sighting in Hawaii

Check out this awesome animated GIF PL put together from a sequence of pictures I took of a humpback whale in Hawaii last December! Thanks PL!

Seats

Seats
Originally uploaded by gecko_12.

I have a short, shameful confession to make. I want more people to view my flickr photostream. To this end, I have implemented a two-pronged Plan. 1) upload some of my coolest pictures from over the years (not just recent ones), and 2) add them to groups in hopes that they might get some more notice. I think #2 is the general strategy of most popular flickrites. I also noticed recently after browsing through the explore/interestingness pages that if I comment or favorite some random person's picture, sometimes they comment on one of mine too. It's a nice reciprocity thing.

In other news. Seattle was hot today. It's midnight and my apartment is still overly warm. Of course, I will forever be shunned by my family (in CA) for claiming that mid-70s is hot, but I've been here for 7 years... I can't help it. I've acclimated. Fortunately for me (as I have a LOT of work to do in the next 6 weeks or so) the weather is supposed to take a turn for the worse in a few days. Can't have too much sunshine and happiness mocking me while I spend all my time in front of the computer.